


What Could've Been- Spock/Kirk

by Merc_with_a_mouth



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Crash Landing, Death, Injury, M/M, Major Character Injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2017-01-02
Packaged: 2018-09-14 02:14:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9153058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merc_with_a_mouth/pseuds/Merc_with_a_mouth
Summary: Jim! I can’t waste anymore time on what could’ve been. Good-bye my . . . my t'hy'la. This is the last time I will permit myself to think of you or even your name again.





	

“Wake up.”

This is not logical. It is not the proper course of action.

His human half screams at him, firing canons at his heart, trying to make him see that reason isn't all it's cracked up to be. This feeling may not be logical, but it sure as hell feels like a tidal wave of euphoria flooding over him. Surely that's worth more than some outdated rationale that only applies to the Vulcan within him?

Or perhaps not.

Logic clearly dictates that Spock should be in search of a suitable mate in order to further the Vulcan species and delay inevitable extinction. He is one of an endangered kind, and therefore his primary function should involve future procreation with the best possible Vulcan ancestry to progress his bloodline and increase the number of his species in the universe. Not only that despite his disadvantage he is an exemplary example of what a Vulcan should be. Emotions, love, infatuation- all these foreign feelings are not necessary in reproduction but they are what his green-blooded heart desires.

Jim... Captain Kirk is the exact opposite of what he should be fixating on.

He feels as if he is a child once again. Control is something he lacked and now it is just as alien to him as it was back then. What kind of hold does James Tiberius Kirk have over him? And why does escape seem so futile? 

It’s like drowning. The tidal wave that has consumed him is filling his lungs with its azure blue. He is fighting it but his limbs are weakening and he needs to catch his breath. He needs that sweet release but it seems just a little too far out of reach. 

The magnitude of confusion this one man has managed to cause him is beyond comprehension. It's beyond what Spock deems normal and would suggest ventures further into abnormal. It feels as though his brain has formed an unbreakable bond with the captain, one that will last a lifetime and affect him in ways he does not understand. 

Oh how he wishes his father had never met Abigail. 

His human side is winning against logic. It’s a battle he has been fighting for years but until now his vulcan side had been victorious. That thought alone shakes him. Thirty years broken down as easily as that. How did he allow James Kirk to have this kind of power over him?

It isn’t just the infatuation. Hand in hand with that comes a network of other emotions, which have been suppressed his entire life. Anger. Angry at Jim for making him feel this way, angry at him for making him feel at all. Angry at himself for allowing this to happen. Angry at his mother, his father, every person he’s ever known. And then is the hopelessness and fear. Fear that Jim won’t reciprocate his emotions. Fear that Jim would no longer be comfortable working around him if he knew. And hopelessness because his fear will never let him tell his captain. It would be inappropriate. Jim is his captain first and foremost. 

“Spock!” He is torn from his mind violently and drawn into a yet another whirlwind he is not fully able to understand. Had he really been unresponsive long enough to warrant that kind of aggression- in his state he wouldn’t be surprised. The Vulcan takes a look around for the first time, perhaps too drawn to his captain to have fully processed their situation as of yet.

It’s a wreck. Various components of their surface ship lay scattered around them. It’s highly improbable that they should have even have survived given the parameters of the crash site. If Spock believed in miracles, he’d be certain this were one. 

He makes a move to sit up.

“Please, you need to stay still.” Only then does he see the panic in his Captain’s eyes and his heart drops. 

A hand on his shoulder keeps him firmly pinned down, Jim Kirk looking down on him only a few inches above. His heartbeat is erratic but the look on his Captain’s face makes it uncertain what the stimulus may be. The colour drains from Jim’s skin and Spock glances down only to see flash of red and green before his view is immediately obscured. 

“How are we going to get out of this one, Spock?” A heavy sigh paired with watery eyes makes Spock’s chest ache and his breath stop. The primal urge in him tells him to reach out, to touch, just to be close to the man but he resists.

“We will do what we have always done, Jim. We will find hope in the impossible.”

“I’m not sure hope is enough anymore.” Their eyes meet and all Spock can see is pain, deep and pure, rooted into every fibre of his being and sewn into every inch of his soul. “Wait here.” Jim rips his eyes away and Spock watches him go, his internal struggle now more of a strain than ever. He wants to follow but fears that it is not his place and he is not willing to disobey direct orders from a superior. 

He can’t recall how all of this happened. He can’t recall crashing. He can’t even recall being sent on an away mission. Nor can he recall the first moment he looked at his captain and was left speechless. He can’t place the first time his heart skipped a beat in response to his captain’s presence. He can’t remember the first time he knew he needed James Tiberius Kirk in his life forever or he would lose himself. None of this was normal. All of this was positively preposterous for a Vulcan to comprehend let alone feel. He was, in the Vulcan sense, head over heels for this man with absolutely no hope left on his part. 

And now he’s stuck on a hostile planet with only his Captain for companionship. 

He hasn’t been alone with Jim, not since Spock realised. The day it happened he cut ties that had been there for years. He left his captain in the dust for the most part and never gave any explanation as to why. This is the first time they have spoken to one another without a third and impartial party present, and usually it was strictly business. They kept away from conversations not directly connected to starfleet. Spock can tell he hurt Jim but they both smiled through the pain. He can tell Jim resents him for what he’s done but neither is willing to be the first to bring up these issues. They are both too stubborn for that. 

That’s when Jim returns. He kneels down beside his first officer once again startling him from his mind. Pain aches through the captain but he puts on a front and focuses all his attention on patching up his partner.

“I’m going to need to stitch you up.” There are so many faults with Starfleet’s medical detail. One of which is the emergency medi-kit in every shuttle. The equipment they provide is borderline archaic in itself. Rather than the contemporary equipment they have aboard the Enterprise, the medi-kit provides centuries old methods of healing such as needle and thread- not something many people are proficient in nowadays. Not only that but according to regulations a shuttle of the size Jim and Spock were travelling in is only required to carry enough medical supplies for one person (usually the most senior member who requires them), despite the shuttle being designed to carry as many as eight people.

Luckily Jim’s ability to sew is paralleled only to the likes of Bones, who taught him not so long ago. Jim’s a fast learner and had no problem keeping up with vital information that could one day potentially save lives.

Spock refuses to look at Jim as he threads the needle. Instead he lets his mind wonder yet again. 

He wants to say something. He wants to explain everything to his captain and regain whatever bond they had held before but at the same time he doesn’t ever want Jim to know. He doesn’t want to look on his captains face and see pity. Vulcans are not to be pitied. 

This time it’s the pain that pulls him back into reality. 

He can’t stop the groan building in the back of his throat as the sensation overwhelms him. It’s sharp and shooting and sure as hell isn’t going to be as quick and seamless as the usual medical attention he receives. 

“Take this.” Kirk hands him a syringe- painkiller mixed with some new century antibiotics to fight off any infection known to man. He doesn’t look anywhere but up at the sky as he stabs himself in the thigh with the needle. Such medication has advanced so significantly that the effect is almost instantaneous. The relief would be a blessing if Spock believed in a high authoritarian being of spiritual and celestial intent but such is not the case, so he’d settle for saying it felt good, better than good, right. “Better?” Jim asks with same frowning, gruff tone. They friendship has definitely taken a toll for the worst and by the sound of that tone, repair seems futile. 

“I am adequate.” 

“Good. I’m finished.” The medication had numbed him to the point of not feeling the needle weaving in and out of his skin- extraordinary stuff. 

“Thank you, Jim.” It’s sincere. Despite Jim being his captain, Spock wouldn’t have expected him to be this concerned about him after the last few months.

“Can’t have my first officer dying on me.” It’s a grimace on his lips; no longer one of disgust but pain instead. Something he had hid so well until now. 

Jim’s brow is drenched in a thick layer of sweat. He's trembling and his skin is deathly pale but from the outside Spock can see no reason to suspect why.

“Jim?” The outsider’s point of view Spock possesses shows no reason for such a sudden change to occur. It’s immediate in its effect and knocks his captain backwards, forcing the wind from his lungs. 

Maybe all isn’t what appears to be.

Maybe nothing is as simple as you first suspect.

What if everything Spock had been seeing has been a facade? 

Would his brain lie to his like that? He’s a Vulcan- such a thing shouldn’t be possible for someone as intellectually mannered as he but it appears maybe it is. Just because it’s improbable doesn’t mean it can’t be true; after all if you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

Jim Kirk reaches a shaking hand down to the cusp of his shirt, lifting it up in one jagged yet telling movement. 

A jarring wound indents itself firmly into the skin of his abdomen. It’s striking in its crimson beauty but also dangerously frightening in its existence. The blood cascading from the wound is so pure and priceless to men. It’s precious but also vital. You lose too much and just like that you’re very being fades from the universe leaving an empty casing in its place. The very thing that made you you is gone because you lost just a little bit too much of the world’s most treasured liquid. 

It makes no sense. There isn’t a tear in Jim’s shirt that could warrant that kind of gash. It’s immense but also fundamentally impossible.

“Jim-?”

“I changed my shirt.” It’s said with a faint but haunting hint of a raspy splutter to the voice. Consequently that also makes no sense. Why would he try to hide his wounds? It’s illogical.

“Why?” His brain is a mess of confusion and fear. He is watching his captain slip away in front of him and he doesn’t know what he can do.

“I couldn’t let you die.” It’s vulnerability Spock can see in Jim’s eyes. It’s new. Sure its shrouded in fear but this is something the first officer has never seen before- not in his captain’s eyes. Then why does it feel like he knows it so well. “Starfleet regulations state that any and all supplies of a medical nature go to the most senior member that requires them. It had to be you.” Spock’s wound wasn’t even close to being as severe as Jim’s. Spock had a high chance of survival if the pain didn’t render him useless but Jim- his chance is slim to none and that’s best case scenario. The blood loss is significant and by Spock’s calculations he’ll be unconscious if not dead in mere minutes. “There wasn’t enough.”

Human emotion- a fatal flaw, hamartia. It was always Jim’s but Spock thought (as a Vulcan) he was above that. Perhaps not. 

“This is illogical.” A single tear throws itself down his, scouting the way for a hoard more waiting to be unleashed but it’s fury that consumes him. He’s angry because this isn’t fair. This isn’t how it was supposed to be. He’s angry because he closed himself off from Jim but the captain always kept Spock at heart. Jim would never have alienated him if he knew the truth. Why did it have to take this extreme to realise it.

“I’ve never been logical. Why would I start now?” It’s a small, cocksure, famous Jim Kirk grin on his ashen lips. “It felt right.”

“Because you are my friend.”

“Because I need you, Spock.” And that’s the truth. The ultimate truth. Spock is logical and guarded. Jim is compassionate and reckless. They are literally two halves of a single functioning unit and their differences is why this works- or worked maybe. It hasn’t worked for months because Spock gave into compassion but refused to be reckless, and Jim became guarded but he wasn’t able to be logical about it. They were mismatched, at war with themselves. Their functioning unit became scattered quarters and everything they built fell apart until they reached the final crescendo which pulled them back together like gravity. Spock isn’t as logical and guarded but then Jim isn’t as reckless and overly compassionate. Instead each individual is a balance of the four components, each part forming an eighth of the whole. 

“I’m sorry.” It’s the coda of a bittersweet symphony namely: the apology. The final bow as the curtain falls on their production. The beginning of the end and the song to end all songs. A tale as old as time never failing to break hearts, never learning from mistakes, always leaving it just a little too late. “Jim, I…”

“I’m going to miss you, Spock.” He can hear it- the breath dying on those heroic lips. A terrible ending to a fragmented story. He wants to tell him everything; tell Jim he’s his friend, his brother in arms, his lover at heart, he is soulmate but he just can’t seem to find the words. It’s a cry in his frontal lobe, the Broca’s area. A failure of the brain.

“Jim, please…” just stay with me. Hold on. Don’t go. Don’t leave me behind. I need you too. I’ll miss you too. Instead, “Thank you.” He says ‘Thank you’ it’s a flat first flute in a five piece wind band. It just doesn’t sit right. 

“I should have told you sooner.” Only a couple of minutes or so now. “I should’ve told you everything.” With each word breathing becomes harder. He’ll be dead before he’s unconscious. The only thing stopping Spock from ripping his stitches out and sewing them into Jim, from pumping every millilitre of blood he has into Jim’s body is the look in his eyes. One so full of adoration and respect as if Spock could do no wrong; a look of infatuation and obsession one that would have once made Spock feel weightless. Oh he wishes he could be so naive. He wishes he could go back in time grab Jim and never let him go. “I shouldn’t have let you slip through my fingers.”

“Tell me now.” It’ll haunt him everyday but he needs to know. He needs to know that he was too late and he needs to live that pain everyday until it breaks him. 

“Don’t waste time on what could’ve been.” His eyes close. Perhaps not having enough energy to keep them open anymore. 

“Jim, I lo…”

“Tell Bones he’s a dick.” It’s a ghost of a laugh but Spock’s smiles even if only slightly. Only Jim would be able to laugh on his deathbed. “She’s all yours now. Take good care of her.” The words die with him. His breathing stops and his heart fails. Spocks tries until he is weak to keep him alive until the enterprise finds them. He does Cpr until he’s raw. He uses every little bit of energy he has left to keep his captain alive and when that fails he prays to a god he doesn’t believe in to switch places. It isn’t until Bones is stood beside him trying to pull the Vulcan off their fallen captain that he’s fully immersed in reality. He’s thrown head first into agony. 

“He’s gone, Spock.” And Spock wants nothing more than to be gone with him.

  
_Jim!  I can’t waste anymore time on what could’ve been._ _Good-bye my . . . my t'hy'la. This is the last time I will permit myself to think of you or even your name again._


End file.
